On the one hand, this is good for the New York Times…they’re obviously keeping up with the blogosphere, as well as they should…they’ve got some of the best writers in the world there.

If Google and Microsoft even sneeze they get noticed in the blogosphere. Today the “big” news is that Google Webmaster is coming out of beta and Microsoft’s response to the speculation about the next version of Windows…WOW.

I don’t think this is a bad thing for Techmeme, either. It’s just tracking what the blogs are talking about…and what they’re talking about is what big media is talking about. If it is tracking the social streams of news, then that’s great, even if it feels like an echo chamber at times.

From a personal standpoint, I try to read people who shy away from recapitulating. On second thought, maybe I don’t subscribe to them simply because I know I can find the info out on Techmeme. That’s probably more likely.

Sometimes I struggle with choosing topics myself. Obviously, there is news that should be shared, like the recent Pew study on Tagging, for example. I want you folks to know about that, so I’ll blog about it even though I know there is a high probability that you’ll hear about it elsewhere.

I appreciate what Alex Barnett said. Something to the effect of: “If I see it on Techmeme, I won’t blog about it”. I probably wouldn’t go to that extreme, but I understand the sentiment.

I wonder if people who have been around for several paradigm-changing technologies watch this sort of thing happening and secretly repeat to themselves: “meet the new boss, same as the old boss”.